That's the Obama campaign's attempt at a post-debate zinger. It's as if Obama expected Mitt Romney to show up in the form that Obama supporters have been sculpting in the media! Perhaps that's how Obama's sparring partner in the debate prep portrayed Romney. Oh, how I'd love to get the secret video of Obama practicing debating Romney with John Kerry playing the role of Romney. I think it would explain a lot.

The next day, Obama was all hey, who was that guy, that spirited fellow who claimed to be Mitt Romney? I'd love to see the drafts of that speech so I could know what set of words evolved into "that spirited fellow." Did they send the draft back to the 18th century for tweaking?

When you zing, you've got to expect counter-zing. You can build on that meme. If Obama wants to nudge people to think that wasn't the real Mitt Romney, you can flip that and say it was Obama who seemed unfamiliar? Who was that tired, cranky character we saw next to Romney? It wasn't the Obama we know, the confident, striding, beaming, charismatic master of language and persuasion we've believed in and trusted these last 4 years.

Who was that very unspirited fellow who claimed to be Barack Obama? Whoever it was that was on stage Thursday night doesn't want to be held accountable for what the real Barack Obama has been saying for the 4 years.... Here's the truth....

Who was that tired, cranky character we saw next to Romney? It wasn't the Obama we know, the confident, striding, beaming, charismatic master of language and persuasion we've believed in and trusted these last 4 years.

Seriously, turning Obama's debate performance around to compliment him (he's usually so wonderful!) seems like a very very bad idea to me.

In short, Obama is a coward and unwilling to challenge Romney face-to-face, but prefers to lie about his opponent when they cannot fight back. Something that Paul Ryan and the Supreme Court are intimately familiar with.

Romney said Wednesday night he will not get rid of the pre-existing condition requirement when he repeals Obamacare. Well that means he will not be repealing Obamacare because you can not do one without the other. Conservatives should be howling over that Romney flip flop.

Obama is a coward and an intellectual lightweight. He didn't confront Romney because he doesn't dare to do so in a forum where he can be publicly crushed by Romney's response. He he ducks his head and hides until he can speak unopposed to the country's most gullible demographic.

"Well that means he will not be repealing Obamacare because you can not do one without the other."

-- Repeal AND replace is the core of Romney's message. The part of the ACA that covers pre-existing conditions could have passed on its own with near unanimity in Congress. In fact, most of the Good Parts of the law could pass without much debate. Omnibus legislation, though, dragged good things in with bad.

Guys like Mitt Romney have been keeping me in a job for the last 25 years. I've started out working in dotcom startups after I graduated from NYC. Since then, I've worked in companies that succeeded from that startup basis... many of them producing websites you read every day.

Big, bad monsters like Romney (and other venture capitalists) put up the money to fund those companies. They are largely responsible for all those great consumer and information websites you visit. Granted, Bain was more oriented toward arbitrage than startups.

How in the world did people convince themselves that the venture capitalists are blood sucking vampires? That was the crazy image Obama hung on Romney!

I've known and worked closely with guys like Romney for the past 25 years. They are always energetic, smart, friendly and humane. They have to be to be committed to taking the risks they take... in people.

Yes, a venture capitalist takes his ideas, and he invests his money in people. Imagine that! Those horrible vampires invest in people!

"I wonder if Ann has an opinion all the lies that Romney told during the debate."

-- The first half hour, Obama's entire argument, about $5 trillion, was based on a lie that CNN and others debunked before the debate. So, for the first half hour, Romney was telling the truth and Obama was lying. But, no one seems to talk about "all the lies that Obama told during the debate."

Romney said Wednesday night he will not get rid of the pre-existing condition requirement when he repeals Obamacare. Well that means he will not be repealing Obamacare because you can not do one without the other.

Don't worry, a Romney spokesperson clarified after the debate that was one of the untruths that Romney said.

Not that it matters but Obama's right on the merits. As Obama said, Mitt has proposed 5 trillion in cuts to income tax rates and refuses to say what he would do to offset them. Mitt's response was that it simply isn't true that he's proposing 5 trillion dollars in cuts. It wasnt clear whether he was referring to his unspecified offsetting tax increases or that he wont cut rates by 5trillion, as he has said he would. Either way his position is untenable.

You can not keep the pre existing condition requirement without government playing a large role in making sure the insurance pool is expanded. That's a fact. But conservatives want to be played while Romney runs back to the middle where he was always wanted to be.

DBP: #2 is probably the case. Remember, we have White House insiders who leaked that Obama personally dislikes Romney. They picked John Kerry to be Romney in the debate prep, and Obama blew off most of his prep work. They thought that Lehrer would have Obama's back ("Now might be a good time to change the topic,") but Lehrer gave Obama more time and Obama didn't do anything with it. It was a colossal failure from a campaign stand point.

Not that it matters but Obama's right on the merits. As Obama said, Mitt has proposed 5 trillion in cuts to income tax rates and refuses to say what he would do to offset them. Mitt's response was that it simply isn't true that he's proposing 5 trillion dollars in cuts. It wasnt clear whether he was referring to his unspecified offsetting tax increases or that he wont cut rates by 5trillion, as he has said he would. Either way his position is untenable.

Leftists shocked that Romney keeps saying what he's been saying for the last 12 months on the campaign trail. Look, I don't love Romney, and won't vote for him, but the left's critcisms are ... BS. He lost. He's a loser. The first time he ever had to go out and defend HIS record. Not as easy as he thought.

Most amusing is the new leftist line that Romney/Ryan are liars. God, the kettle is calling the pot black. (is it ok to say that?).

Obama is doing the only thing he can do in the wake of his distracted, aloof, and disengaged performance at the first debate, which is to focus after the fact on what his team will define as the failings of Romney's perfomance, namely, the inconsistency between Romney's claims on the campaign trail so far and his claims at the debate.

Every politician who has made a serious gaffe or blunder must attempt a similar post-blunder salvage job.

What Obama really must count on to counter the after effects of this first debate is to come back strong and do better in their next two debates.

Matthew Sablan, I, too, wondered about that "change the topic" line. Lehrer wrote a great book (sorry; don't know how to link through the blog-kickback scheme) about moderating the debates. In it, he says only he knows what questions he'll ask. Obama wasn't thinking very clearly when he said that. He was a little too Presidential: I'm in charge, Jim, and I'll humor you for just a bit longer, but do what I say.

I think Obama has to take this line of attack. Obama's whole strategy has been to make Romney not be an acceptable alternative. That is why Obama has been attacking Romney's character, etc.. On Wednesday night, Romney wasn't just acceptable, he was preferrable.

The problem for Obama, is what if Romney performs at the same level in the next two debates. Then the Obama meme will collapse entirely.

For example, by refusing to open American energy for drilling, Obama is costing the country billions (maybe trillions over the 10 year time frame required to get the $5 trillion Obama bandies about) in revenue. But, you don't say it that way, do you?

By over paying Solyndras at a ridiculous rate (giving them more money than 5 decades worth of money to oil companies, note), Obama has robbed the economy of billions which, over 10 years, may have compounded to trillions. Obama has lost trillions in revenues -- just from Solyndra type errors and his refusal to support energy. But no one says Obama is burning trillions of revenue the government could have.

Why? Because words mean things. So, if you insist that Romney's plan would cost us $5 trillion in revenue, you need to accept that Obama's plans are even worse -- and that's before we even -touch- his proposed budgets that would have lost so much revenue not even his own party supported it.

Or, perhaps, you just mean: "I don't like Romney. Here's a club. Let's beat a horse with it."

You can not keep the pre existing condition requirement without government playing a large role in making sure the insurance pool is expanded. That's a fact

Really? and you know this how?

Oddly, the federal employee plan, FEHB, has always had a no pre existing condition exclusion requirement. Dozens of insurance providers are invited to bid, annually, to be part of the group providing FEHB benefits. The prices vary, but every one includes pre existing conditions.

Somehow they manage the actuarial task of coverage pool expansion to accomplish this, group wise and nationwide...and they do so without adding or creating one single new department or agency to oversee them.

Oddly, in 2004, John Kerry proposed a national health care system modeled on FEHB. It was the only thing Kerry ever suggested that I liked, otherwise I detest the man.

Jay Retread said...Romney said Wednesday night he will not get rid of the pre-existing condition requirement when he repeals Obamacare. Well that means he will not be repealing Obamacare because you can not do one without the other. Conservatives should be howling over that Romney flip flop.

============Oh. yeah.Like pragmatic conservatives want a carved in stone idealogue like the Left has in Obama! (cept his extrajudicial assassinations lefties now think aren't war crimes because....well..Black Messiah does them)

Conservatives actually go around touting how wonderful the pre-Obama health insurance industry was. How happy they were with premiums that rose 15% a year before they went up 20% a year under Obama. How they love people barred from health insurance on pre-existing conditions and paying 40-300% more for prescription drugs than Canadians do.

There's an old warning in show biz (Shout may be able to back me up here) about believing your own PR.

Zero is somewhere between Luxor and Aswan right about now. That's about the only way he can rationalize what happened. Fact is, the Romster was prepared and Zero took shilol's advice - 90% of life is just showing up.

Of course, he's been doing that all his life.

Andy R. said...

Why are you repeating debunked lies?

How much do you think the Romney tax cuts would cost in lost revenue?

When taxes go down, revenue goes up, genius.

PS I see it took all day yesterday for Central Control to come up with talking points for the trolls.

Robert Cook said... No, they've used our money to reimburse their bosses on Wall Street and in the banking institutions for their losses incurred in the commission of fraud against their customers.

And they're taking more to reward their cronies in the insurance and medical industries. So why do you support that Cook?

Your criticisms of Democrats are all in the past, while you support their prospective policies with the same features. It's almost like you only highlight your differences with Democrats only when they're too late to matter. Don't tell me you do this in a futile effort to establish your non-partisanship. It would truly be crushing to realize your schtick is an act.

You can not keep the pre existing condition requirement without government playing a large role in making sure the insurance pool is expanded. That's a fact

Really? and you know this how?

Oddly, the federal employee plan, FEHB, has always had a no pre existing condition exclusion requirement. Dozens of insurance providers are invited to bid, annually, to be part of the group providing FEHB benefits. The prices vary, but every one includes pre existing conditions.

Somehow they manage the actuarial task of coverage pool expansion to accomplish this, group wise and nationwide...and they do so without adding or creating one single new department or agency to oversee them.

This is also largely true in the private sector before Obamacare. As usual Retread has no idea what he's talking about.

Andy R. said...I wonder if Ann has an opinion all the lies that Romney told during the debate.

It's easy to seem like you won a debate when you don't have to tell the truth.

==================That does seem to be the narrative of queer and progressive Jewish fanboys.Ignore everything Obama has been saying since 2004 is a lie, much of his life is a lie, all his campaign promises in 2008 were lies...

And claim the guy that showed whan an affirmative action fraud Andy's messiah is - only made Obama his witless punk by lying.

But don't worry Andy, off the debate floor, the TelePrompters are turned back on and if there is one thing Obama has done in his life that is truly exceptional - it is the ability to read the stuff Team Axelrods writers create and make it sound compelling when it comes out of his mouth.

John Kerry: Corporations are people who who need special favors. The untaxed 47% of the population are lazy victims and the sort I like to fire. I plan to raise trillions of taxes on the middle class to personally enrich myself and my crony friends as we gleefully ship jobs overseas. On day one I will force my religious beliefs on others. No birth control. No caffeine. No sexy underwear.

Obama: Americans reject your vision of America, Governor.

John Kerry: You're right, good sir. I realize now I'm a misguided, robotic, flip-flopping shell of a man. You. You. You win.

(1) When did we start this ridiculous business of talking about budgetary items over ten-year timeframes? We didn't always do this; in fact, I think it's very new. The budget deficit was how much we spent that we hadn't the money actually to pay for in FY whatever. Now we're talking in ten-year terms all the time.

Is it just that if the numbers are huge enough to bewilder the readers/listeners with zeroes, no one will think of them as real any more? Or is it that if you make ten-year projections, you are guaranteed to be out of the Oval Office by the time they can be evaluated?

(2) Ann, aren't we going to get an account of what it looked like at UW/Madison during the grand Presidential rally -- excuse me, totally educational visit?

Matthew, you can not keep the pre existing condition mandate but repeal the rest of Obamacare. If that was done the insurance system would crash and the Federal government would be forced to take it over.

Romney said Wednesday night he will not get rid of the pre-existing condition requirement when he repeals Obamacare. Well that means he will not be repealing Obamacare because you can not do one without the other.

Actually as 2008 Obama voter Megan McArdle pointed out – HIPAA already made it illegal to deny coverage for preexisting conditions so long as you maintained coverage. The only thing that ObamaCare does is make it possible for people to drop their coverage and then wait until they‘re sick to buy insurance.

Not a dime. The Laffer Curve and supply side economics has proven (over and over again) that when you inject money into the economy, it produces more producers, hence more taxpayers.

And don't bother spewing the leftwing cant about trickle-down economics, because every time marginal taxes are lowered, the government realizes more revenues. Every single time. And I defy anyone here who doesn't believe this to come up with one example.

All you who are defending Romney, how would you react if a Democrat said he was going to lower the age for Medicate eligibility to 55, and said that he was going to pay for it in full with unspecified cuts to inessential federal programs, not including defense, Social Security, or Medicare, the only concrete example offered being Sesame street? Would you consider it legitimate for his opponent to say that he had proposed a multi-trillion dollar spending increase that would inevitably result in some combination of tax increases for the middle class and cuts to Social Security and the defense budget?

"All you who are defending Romney, how would you react if a Democrat said he was going to lower the age for Medicate eligibility to 55, and said that he was going to pay for it in full with unspecified cuts to inessential federal programs, not including defense, Social Security, or Medicare, the only concrete example offered being Sesame street?"

-- All of you who are attacking Romney, how would you react if INSERT ENTIRELY DISSIMILAR THING HERE THAT HAS NO BEARING ON THE DISCUSSION WE WERE LOSING.

Jay Retread said... Matthew, you can not keep the pre existing condition mandate but repeal the rest of Obamacare. If that was done the insurance system would crash and the Federal government would be forced to take it over.

And yet the pre-existing condition limitations have existed without Obamacare for over a decade. So do we believe our actual experience or Jay Retread's talking points?

My fave part of debate, was when Obama said you get a tax break for sending jobs overseas. I immediately thought, "what, that can't be true. What politician would do that." And then Romney fired back, that's a new one, I have been in business 25 years and have never heard of that break. Basically OBAMA doesn't know what he's talking about. He just reads lines. MITT knows his stuff.

Obama kept making the same promises he did 4 years ago about the deficit and I thought, Why would I believe you NOW? You have had 4 years and did the opposite.

People believe him because of how well he reads a teleprompter and does his "preacher" routine about "Tax Pol-i-saaaaaay!" and he doesn't know the tax policies.

To a leftist, confronting them with the truth about a lie they've committed to believing makes YOU a liar.

To a leftist, if any complex statement of truth can be truncated, broken into component pieces or taken out of context and be made to LOOK like a lie, it will be, and that act will be called "fact checking."

If that was done the insurance system would crash and the Federal government would be forced to take it over.

Are you really saying that the main reason medical costs are going up is due to pre-existing conditions?

Have you ever heard of high risk pools, where the government and insurers chip in to offset the costs of these folks? Just about every forward-thinking think tank has come up with ideas like these.

I've been in the business (health insurance, hospital finance, physician groups) for 23 years. Your statement comes from someone who read somewhere what he wanted to believe, and decided that it was the truth no matter what.

Jay - you're in a realm where you have little information. Get more educated before you spout off.

Easy-peasy Grand Bargain way to lower the tax rates: tax income earned by trading on the stock market the same as anything else (but with the ability to adjust your cost basis to reflect inflation rates since you bought the stock, and to subtract off interest income corresponding to the inflation during the time period the interest was earned). I used to buy the whole "capital gains as double-taxation" argument until we looked at buying property to rent out. Same thing: putting your capital to work. But no tax break there.

Oh, and make the payment of dividends tax deductible for corporations and taxable just as any other income for recipients.

And replace Obamacare with Vouchercare for everone, not just seniors: enough voucher money for everyone to buy at least a basic catastrophic insurance policy. Mandate that any insurance company that receives the vouchers allow a one-time enrollment of people with preexisting conditions. Easy!

My daughter has epilepsy. When she was little and before HIPAA we moved from Vermont to Illinois and we couldn't afford the COBRA insurance in-between jobs. Because of her epilepsy we had a 'pre-existing condition' and she wouldn't be covered for the epilepsy for six months. She'd be covered for everything else, ear infection, broken bone, well-child visits, etc. At the end of the six-month period she'd be covered for the epilepsy too.

Yes, it can cost out of pocket for treatment for a pre-existing condition, but it doesn't mean you'll never be covered for that condition. Just that the insurance company would like a few premiums under its belt before it starts paying out. The insurance company would like you to have a little skin the game too.

"It wasn't the Obama we know, the confident, striding, beaming, charismatic master of language and persuasion we've believed in and trusted these last 4 years."

As several here have stated, Obama has never been this way in any situation where 1) he is without TOTUS, or 2) there is no fellating interviewer/media tingler. When cahllenged, which is very infrequently, he is shallow, brittle, and petty. He is a coward.

This is why those jobs are never coming back, as it would harm the profit margins of the companies sending jobs overseas.

Another thing that hurts the US is our tax policy when companies repatriate money made overseas back into the US. Steve Jobs tried to talk to Obama about this- we tax it at a high enough rate that it discourages companies from bringing that money back into the US and reinvesting it there.

"At least, those jobs will never come back until conditions here change such that we are willing to accept drastically lower wages and benefits, (or no benefits), in order simply to have a job."

-- Or when conditions improve over seas, which they are, thanks to having jobs to start pulling themselves out of poverty.

Now, I admit -- it is not the best arrangement over seas. But, for a lot of people, these factories are a chance they may never have had before. It's not perfect, but I try not to let the perfect be the enemy of saving people, however bad the situation they are being saved into is.

At least, those jobs will never come back until conditions here change such that we are willing to accept drastically lower wages and benefits, (or no benefits), in order simply to have a job.

Not necessarily. The onerous rules and heavy UN-necessary regulations, as well as crushing corporate taxes are the main issues that drive businesses over seas AND which drive small business out of business.

Remove those barriers to operating and employers would be able to pay their employees generous wages.

Remove the ridiculous high cost of Obamacare and employers will be able to afford decent medical coverage.

Remove the demands for obscene pension plans and employers can afford reasonable retirement plans like a 401K or Simple IRA.

Employers want to keep and train quality employees and are quite aware that the benefits and wages are what will do that.

HOWEVER....employers and businesses are not charities and cannot be magnanimous and LOSE money at the same time.

In other words, the middle-class society we have come to expect as a norm--although it was largely a post-WWII phenomenon--is gone, never to return.

I actually agree with this, to some extent. The post-WWII phenomenon was fleeting, and should NEVER have been expected to be the norm.

However, the U.S. can somewhat counteract this - the economy can be segmented so that the menial factory jobs are offshored, and the higher, more technical jobs can be done here. That would require, however, that our education system is completely overhauled, and the work/learn ethic be increased 10 fold. Not likely to happen, unfortunately.

"However, the U.S. can somewhat counteract this - the economy can be segmented so that the menial factory jobs are offshored, and the higher, more technical jobs can be done here. That would require, however, that our education system is completely overhauled, and the work/learn ethic be increased 10 fold."

-- Without "menial" factory jobs, there isn't enough work for our current population. At least, barring some revolutionary new, easy to enter, "non-menial" field that doesn't have a lot of requirements.

- All of you who are attacking Romney, how would you react if INSERT ENTIRELY DISSIMILAR THING HERE THAT HAS NO BEARING ON THE DISCUSSION WE WERE LOSING.

Actually, it's a very close analogy. Mitt's proposed cuts in the tax rates that will cost $5 trillion over 10 years, that's undisputable. He hasn't specified how he will pay for them, that's also undisputable. So how is that different from proposing $5 trillion in spending increases without specifying how you will pay for them?

"And they're taking more to reward their cronies in the insurance and medical industries. So why do you support that Cook?"

Who says I do?

So you're taking the position that attacking criticisms of Obamcare isn't actually supporting it, even though you've never criticized it or have done so only to the extent that it doesn't go far enough.

I watched the debate. I thought Romney won handily. He's very bright and, in the way that Obama knows how to puff soaring rhetoric, Romney knows how to marshal facts in a succinct way and make a convincing power point presentation. That said, I don't think Obama lost the debate in such a way as to lose the election. Obama's arguments were muddled and his grammar and syntax were clumsy, but he didn't look like an unsympathetic human being or a complete idiot. And perhaps that's all it will take to put him over the top.

"I don't understand why so many on the left have allowed themselves to get all worked up against...fracking."

Maybe because there is evidence that fracking is poisoning our drinking water...supplies of which are scarce enough globally, as it is. (I doubt all those opposing fracking are "on the left." Homeowners who find their faucet water is flammable and poisonous to drink are probably not going to support fracking, no matter what their political perspective may be.)

“I think that I’m a better speechwriter than my speechwriters. I know more about policies on any particular issue than my policy directors. And I’ll tell you right now that I’m gonna think I’m a better political director than my political director.”

I'm guessing you've had first-year students who thought they were more lawyer than you. Imagine being Senator Kerry locked in a room with that self-regarding peacock -- I don't think this was Kerry's fault, at all.

"So how is that different from proposing $5 trillion in spending increases without specifying how you will pay for them?"

-- To answer this. If I say: "I'm going to buy something!" I need to know how much it costs. If I decide not to sell blood, I have not lost any money. I still have the exact same amount as before; I've decided simply that I should not spend more.

One is using a finite resource the other is electing not to collect more of a resource. It's... kind of complicated, but simple. If you pick up all the apples that is different from choosing to leave the apples for the forest creatures (and/or evil witches.)

In 2009, tax filers, who had earnings in excess of $200,000, had aggregate earnings of $788 Billion which is $7.8 Trillion over ten years.

So the innumerate Obama claims Romney is going to cut taxes on these high earners by $5 Trillion? That would mean they are paying at least 64% in federal taxes now! This shows it is Obama who is the liar or he is just plain dumb.

-- No. The thing that is costing is spending money. We could spend less; spend more efficiently, etc. There are many solutions. We do not, however, need to even -reach- this discussion, since as Jay helpfully pointed out, even the Obama campaign admits that this is an untrue statement about Romney.

So, let us wash our hands of this and chalk it up to Obama simply being unprepared and desperate.

I think most people still see Obama as the favorite, but it is no longer inevitable. And by "rally," I assume you mean rally from the Obama we saw on Wednesday night. That's like how he argues his jobs numbers -- take the low point and count up from there. So yes, he'll rally from the TOTUSless stupor he was in and be more engaged and smiling to appeal to people who vote based on that.

I still fear we are about to reelect a narcissistic coward who sucks at his job.

We need to get insurance companies out of the "pre-paid" health that we have now that's called "insurance". When health care feels "free" because it's all covered by being pre-paid people don't shop around or ration themselves. People go to the doctor for any little thing because it's "free".

Say for instance that you can fill your car up at the gas station anytime for "free" because of pre-paid car insurance. People would be filling their cars up constantly, keeping them topped off, driving all the time even just for driving's sake. All because it's "free".

When we have to pay attention to the costs of gas however, we ration ourselves. We plan our driving to be more efficient, to get more done in the same trip instead of going out and back and out and back and out and back...

When I was a kid insurance was really insurance. It covered emergencies and hospitalization. Mom and Dad paid the doctor when we had to go for well-child physicals for school or the odd ear infection or strep throat.

To answer this. If I say: "I'm going to buy something!" I need to know how much it costs. If I decide not to sell blood, I have not lost any money. I still have the exact same amount as before; I've decided simply that I should not spend more.

Mitt didn't say he wasn't going to spend more, he said he was going to cut tax rates by 20% without decreasing revenues. We need to know how he's going to offset the cuts.

Well the spirit seems to be just spin out stuff and hope nobody notices, but then the folks at Bloomberg checked over Romney's claims and found:His tax plan, however, would upend financial planning for millions of middle-class households, denying them thousands of dollars in annual deductions. Earlier this week, after months of refusing to specify which tax breaks he would curtail, Romney said taxpayers might be able to take a total of no more than $17,000 in deductions each year.That won't bring in enough revenue to make up for almost $5 trillion the government will lose over 10 years once tax rates are reduced by 20 percent as Romney has proposed, according to economist William Gale of the Brookings Institution in Washington."It doesn't come close to paying for the $5 trillion," said Gale, who co-authored a study of Romney's tax plan for the non-partisan Tax Policy Center in Washington.

By the way, here's another problem with shotgun approach to attacking Romney. Maybe what R/V posted is true. Too bad. Jay R., AF and Andy burned my goodwill for the day R/V. You're at a trust deficit; that's what Obama's stupid attacks during the summer did. They've blunted substantive attacks.

Once I found out that the plant DID close in April 2009, that Romney DID NOT give a woman cancer, etc., I find it hard to believe anything that comes out bad about him.

That's why you get your ducks in a row before you strike at a politician.

Why that blanket dismissal, RC? Do you assume that non-profit = higher efficiency?

This is the thing about big-government types. Despite the numerous examples of the government screwing up everything it touches (including health care - almost all insurance fee schedules are based on Medicare rates), they still believe that profit is the driver of all evil, and bureaucracy is not.

Fracking is like coal mining. There are some enviornmental issues but nut job snail dart sucking hippie tree huggers like Cookie want to stop the jobs and lower energy costs that would revitalize depressed areas like upstate New York.

-- No, now you can say things like: Well, we should get those details. Not: He's a filthy liar, so let me make up what he is saying he'll do to make him a filthier liar.

I think you could say more than that. I think you could say that what he's proposing is impossible, and can't be taken seriously. You could say that either he's not going to do what he says he is going to do, or he's going to raise taxes on the middle class to pay for it.

" So, for the first half hour, Romney was telling the truth and Obama was lying. But, no one seems to talk about "all the lies that Obama told during the debate.""

The "lies" argument is the Obama campaign's attempt to cope with the train wreck they had Wednesday night. I see that a couple of local lefties have checked in and gotten the talking points memorized.

Obama's whole campaign has been lies. Wait until next debate with foreign policy ! Obama's pants may catch fire. There are no millions of new jobs, the unemployment rate announced this morning is a lie that will be quietly revised in a couple of weeks.

Romney should, and may eventually, point out that his tax plan is similar to the one Reagan and Tip O'Neill negotiated in 1986 that gave us 15 years of prosperity in the late 80s and 90s. Even Clinton's tax increase in 92 couldn't slow it down.

They lowered rates and closed loopholes, one of which cost me $100,000 that year. Tax shelters went away. Most voters are too young or too dumb to remember that.

I have said several times on this blog going back at least six months that as a liberal I of course want Obama to win, Romney would also have his pluses. We saw that Wednesday night. Romney has no intentions of getting rid of the pre-existing conditions clause, hence he has no clear path to remove Obama/Romneycare.

He will be the most liberal Republican president since Ford. That might be just what the country needs right now.

A deal is doable. A deal that reduces tax rates by 20%, offsets them with revenue increases, and doesn't impact the middle class is not doable. The reason grand bargains are hard is that they require painful choices. A proposal that (1) specifies the benefits, (2) refuses to specify the costs, and (3) insists that the middle class won't bear any of the costs, is not a serious proposal.

In Obamacare, you needn't have continuous coverage and the insurance companies are told by the government they can not charge more than X amount to people with preexisting conditions. Basically, people with preexisting conditions cannot be charged more (or perhaps it is just not more than a certain % more) than people without preexisting conditions.

There are many other ways to handle people with preexisting conditions, but Romney has so far proposed people with continuous coverage not be able to be turned away (on the individual market) due to preexisting conditions.

Mitt didn't say he wasn't going to spend more, he said he was going to cut tax rates by 20% without decreasing revenues. We need to know how he's going to offset the cuts.

It isn't our fault if you uncritically accept anything Obama says as truth.

But I'll explain it to you. Again, not my fault if you don't understand math or human nature.

Our taxes are set up so that you pay no taxes on the first x amount, and then rate n on the next x amount, and then rate n on the next x amount.

It takes energy/effort/time to work to make money. We could all make lots more money if we worked 3 jobs for 120 hours/week total. That's just 17 hours/day, gives you time to travel to work and sleep 8 hours!

Why don't more people do that?

They decide it isn't worth their time. They prefer to have a life than sacrifice everything in pursuit of more money.

When you work, you earn the money that your employee agrees to pay you.

Let me emphasize that: you earn it.

By what right does the govt get to decide you are making too much and take more of it?

If you work the same amount, and have a choice between keeping more of it, or keeping less of it, which choice would most people choose?

Now, let's say you work your minimum, and there is an opportunity to work some overtime. Are you more likely to work that overtime if you are paid 1/3 of your normal pay, or 1.5 times your normal pay?

So based on all that, if you lower taxes, people see the opportunity that working a little more improves their lives more than if taxes are higher. So the small businessman stays open longer, takes more jobs, etc...the doctor sees more patients...the creator exploits economies of scale to a) make more items, b) sell them at a lower price, and c) still make more money because of lower tax rates.

Aside from that, it takes an amassing of money to create new value.

For instance, there is a foreclosed home in bad shape. Just sitting there, no one using it, so someone's investment in the home is lying fallow. The bank that extended the loan isn't getting their loaned money back, either.

It costs $400k, with a down payment of $80k. I want to buy it. If I have $79k saved up, I still can't afford it.

Nothing happens, and no wealth is created.

But then President Romney cuts taxes. I end up paying $1k less in taxes while doing the same amount of work.

I now have enough. I buy it. The original bank gets its money back and can lend it to a small businessman with a great idea for reducing the cost of making an important part for computers, making computers cheaper, which means more people buy computers, pumping more money into that industry, which increases tax revenue despite a lower rate.

I hire people to fix it up. They buy materials. Home Depot sells more materials and pays more in taxes due to the increased sales, which increases revenue despite a lower tax rate.

The people fixing it up earn more money. One of the contractors is really good and has enough work, but agrees to do the work because the lower taxes makes it worth it, he can keep enough to buy the machinery he needs to retire and make quality guitars, so he takes the extra job and works weekends. Despite the lower taxes, the govt gets more in revenue.

After renovation, I rent out the house, increasing the supply of rental homes and lowering the price, so a family is able to afford moving out of their parent's home.

Despite lower taxes, I'm now paying taxes on the rental income, so the govt ends up with more revenue.

Taxes are a drag on the creation of value. Lowering taxes decreases the drag, which increases the amount of value created, which means more value is created. The increase in value created means more value is taxed at a lower rate, still resulting in higher revenue overall.

It's like we're in a car heading for a cliff. Dems want to slam on the brakes (taxes) to make sure we head into the abyss; Republicans want to hit the breaks (taxes) so that we accelerate right over the abyss over to the other side.

"A good Java, Javascript, jQuery programmer can name his price in the U.S."

Assuming they don't simply hire good programmers overseas to do the jobs remotely at far lower prices, and your assertion stays valid, and as a result, kids go to school to train as programmers, the resulting glut in programmers will drive the price programmers can charge way down.

We are, as a matter of fact, headed toward third world status. The only reason it's not apparently so is that most of what most Americans "own" is bought on credit. We're already cash-poor, relative to the standards of living most of us have grown accustomed to.

Well, AF, perhaps President Obama will read your words about Romney's deal not being workable and decide to use that as a criticism, rather than the lie that Romney has been saying something else and lied at the debate.

A proposal that (1) specifies the benefits, (2) refuses to specify the costs, and (3) insists that the middle class won't bear any of the costs, is not a serious proposal.

Nor is Hope and Change, but somehow all these supposed policy wonks now oozing through the floorboards were missing last cycle. It's quite revealing leftists deem the appropriate standard to be whatever best helps the Democratic candidate at that particular moment. This one seems to think policy advances are possible as long as both sides want it, so our focus on replacing Mr. "We won" should win his resounding support.

Well, AF, perhaps President Obama will read your words about Romney's deal not being workable and decide to use that as a criticism, rather than the lie that Romney has been saying something else and lied at the debate.

This is what Obama said at the debate:

"Now, Governor Romney’s proposal that he has been promoting for 18 months calls for a $5 trillion tax cut on top of $2 trillion of additional spending for our military. And he is saying that he is going to pay for it by closing loopholes and deductions. The problem is that he’s been asked a -- over a hundred times how you would close those deductions and loopholes and he hasn’t been able to identify them."